Fund Times: 1 – 5 December

AXA IM Add to Zemek’s Bond Team, New Star's Lenders to Take Ownership; SocGen Trim UK Bond Fund Range; Baillie Gifford Make Change on European Fund Management Team; Gartmore's Redundancies Continue; and JP Morgan to Liquidate Four Funds

Tom Whitelaw 5 December, 2008 | 2:50PM
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AXA IM Add to Zemek’s Bond Team
AXA Investment Managers today announced that it has made two hires on its Fixed Income Credit Team. Graham Nicol has been appointed as Head of Credit ex-US and Mondher Bettaieb Loriot has been appointed as Senior Portfolio Manager. Nicol who has over 23 years of experience in asset management will start his newly created role on 16 December after joining from JP Morgan where he headed up International Investment Grade Credit. While Bettaieb Loriot will join AXA IM in May next year from Swisscanto Asset Management where he is Interim Head of Fixed Income and Senior Credit Portfolio Manager, based in Zurich. Both will be based in London and report to the group’s Global Head of Fixed Income

Theodora Zemek.

New Star's Lenders to Take Ownership
John Duffield's beleaguered New Star Asset Management appears to have found a solution to at least some of its more pressing issues. The firm announced a plan this week that would give its lending syndicate 75% ownership in New Star, and also--critically in our view--attempt to lock in key fund managers. For the full story click here.

SocGen Trim UK Bond Fund Range
Société Générale Asset Management (SGAM) announced this week that it has merged five bond funds into two as part of a plan to rationalise its fixed interest range. As a result the SG Long Dated Corporate Bond and SG Sterling Corporate Bond have been renamed SG Corporate Bond. Meanwhile SG Sterling Bond, SG Long Dated Gilt and the SG Index Linked fund have been merged into a new fund to be called the SG Gilt fund. The changes will not result in any management alterations with Lorenzo Gallenga and Gareth Isaac continuing to run the Gilt portfolio while Gregoire Pesques and Marie-Suzanne Mazelier will stay in charge of the Corporate Bond funds

Baillie Gifford Make Change on European Fund Management Team
Baillie Gifford has announced that with effect from 28 November they have changed the joint fund managers on the Baillie Gifford European fund. John Burke left the firm on 28 November 2008 after almost two years on the fund. He and has subsequently been replaced by Tom Coutts. Peter Hollis and Angus Franklin will continue to jointly manage the fund along-side Coutts. Coutts joined Baillie Gifford in 1999 and is an Investment Manager in the European Investment Team.

Gartmore's Redundancies Continue
Gartmore confirmed this week that UK Focus fund co-manager Ashley Willing and fixed income co-head Karl Bergqwist are likely to be amongst the 60 to 75 redundancies announced previously by the firm. As a result of the changes the UK Focus fund--which is down 54% for the year to date through 4 December, one of the worst losses in its Morningstar peer group--will just be managed by Simon King going forward while Simon Surtees will become the sole charge on Gartmore Corporate Bond.

Elsewhere Gartmore has announced that their head of asset manager sales Simon Clark and their head of strategic partners Julian Hince will also leave the firm.

JP Morgan to Liquidate Four Funds
JP Morgan announced this week that they are to close four funds in their Luxembourg SICAV range. The following funds have shrunk to a size that likely makes the funds uneconomic to run: JPM US Dollar Enhanced Yield, JPM Euro Enhanced Yield, JPM Europe Corporate Bond fund and JPM Sterling Enhanced Yield. The funds are due to be liquidated on Monday 8th December.

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Tom Whitelaw  

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